Bookdonors

Ten years ago a man  and his friend were sitting in an attic looking at a few boxes of old books. At that time, charity shops like Oxfam had to pay the council to come and take away unwanted/unsold second hand books as waste. One of the men, Lawrie Hayworth pondered the possibility of  somehow getting all those books picked up and sold to raise money for various good causes. The person he was talking to was Neil, my dinner companion on their 10th anniversary dinner - a bit of a computer genius who had a little think about it and between the two of them , a rather neat idea began to take shape.

Lawrie and his friend set up a charity that collects books from  a selection of charity shops all over Scotland and the North of  England and sells them online and then distributes the funds raised to all kinds of good causes. In this year, to celebrate their ten annivesary they invited four motly crime writers down to their HQ in the borders, and we had a whale of a time.

Here are my books online, second hand and ready to raise money. 80% of their books sell for a penny and they are allowed to charge £2.80 postage - that is where the 'profit ' comes from. every year over £400 000 pounds  goes on postage.
Initially the charity relied on grants to keep going but then Tom Murdoch-Kenny, seen here with Lin Anderson, took over. He got on board a year or so ago and recognised that it needed to stand on its  own two feet and work within an  ethical, but profitable business framework. To do this he needed to increase the supply chain, sign up all the charity shops, get it all standardised. So now, instead of it being rather informal,  a volunteer drives the books for example from Stranraer up to Ayr, Thurso get theirs down to Dingwall for pick up where they are picked  up by the 'Book Van' three times a week.
The books can be used or brand new, as long as they are sellable.
The charity pays for them by weight.

Me, a knife and a birthday cake.... what could possibly go wrong???

 Strutting our stuff in Hi Vis.

My friend Alanna Knight with a welcome piece of shortbread and a nice hot cup of tea.

Alex Grey doing her impersonation of the blonde one from Abba.

 The new modern premises just outside Galashields houses 32 staff and works for the benefit of local people charities and the environment and 100% of the sales are used to fulfill its triple social mission. Book donors is a living wage employer in a region where jobs are maybe a wee bit thin on the ground and bookdonors continues to supply work and training for both young and old and those with disabilities who might have difficulty integrating into a conventional workplace.

Brian is one of the drivers, he's from Glasgow and we got him to point it out his home city on the map,..... just in case you did not know. Th routes are now regular, picking up from north, west and south ( with a bit of north of England thrown in)

There are three depots but Brian and I thought the one in Glasgow was the best...

Here is the head of operations, it was a bitter cold day in the borders, teeming with rain,. So under our Hi Vis, we kept out coats on and drank the tea.

The brave among us climbed the stairs to look down  over the giant warehouse. A local farmer is the landlord  and gives the charity a very good rate.

They track the cost of the book,  the resale value of the book and how fast it is selling- and how long they expect it to stay on their shelves. 

Down below a co worker moves silently between the huge book cases with a lamp on his head. The books come in and are scanned then stored by date order of their arrival. When you visit Amazon to purchase a book, Bookdonors will be one of the second hand suppliers offered to you and this is where the books  come from. Using a link to Wordery through Amazon, you can also buy new books and the charity gets 5% of the cost.

In 2015 Bookdonors ventured into  Amazon.com as well as Amazon.co.uk and the States have responded very well, over 100 000 sales in the few months they have been operating there.
1.4 million pound turnover is heading up to 1.8 million pounds by March next year.
Soon Ebay and E commerce are getting the Bookdonor treatment.

Row upon now upon row of metal shelving.

The shelves hold 450000 books, 600 000 max. More than 50% will be sold by the end of their shelve life'.

Outside we found the books going for recycle as  they were too damaged or unsellable - the only one we saw ( and there were many copies of it ) was a free giveaway chick lit novella.

This is the books as they come in,packaged in 850 kilos by weight I think. So the charity shop packs them up and the friendly van arrives three times a week and transports them down to the borders. 600 000 thousand books come in per month,

And the back of the vans are rather neat and fabulous.... they have six vans that cover the three regions.

Here it is all summed up....

And on the side of the van....

Deep inside the warehouse, the bookshelves are strengthened by these baskets- that are also full of books so that their weight lends more  reinforcement.

As the books are stored by date of arrival, it leads to some amusing shelf fellows- here the Wrinklies Guide To Wit is right next to the Holy Bible.

Hard at work on the warehouse floor, opening up the arrivals as they come off the van.

and more and more books, boxed up to be opened up, processed and  placed on the shelves.

A co worker sorting out the barcodes. Because it was an important day, she was very well dressed in a pretty blouse but normally it was woolly trousers and big jumpers all the way. It was cold....very cold.

A wee poster, just to show where the money actually goes.

They had arranged for us, some charity representatives,  the founders, some co workers to have a lovely meal in a local visitors centre.

The visitors centre belongs to this place - the ancestral home of a very famous Scottish writer..... can you guess who?

Abbotsford House

My diner companions - Neil the computer genius with the beard and Lawrie the founder with Lin Anderson. The young chappie on the left and I talked about huskies and staffies for the entire meal - he too, was a computer genius. This was the Thursday after Black Friday and he told me that the Monday had been their busiest day ever - something like 2400 books over that Sat /Sun. I think that was what he said, but although I was making notes my hands were so cold the writing is totally illegible! ( No change there!)

My place name.

And my van....

Quoted from the local paper 'all this is achieved by reusing and recycling unwanted books that otherwise would have gone to landfill by purchasing surplus books from charity shops across Scotland and North East England. The achievements of book donors have not gone unnoticed and the Nat West social enterprise 215 100 index which tracks and recognises the performance of social enterprises rated Bookdonors as number 8 in UK retail.' (The Southern Reporter)

I am proud to be sold, and resold, and maybe even resold again.... by Bookdonors.

As I said, it was very cold and I was listening, scribbling and trying to keep quiet (not easy for me!) so if I got my facts wrong I'm sure Tom will correct me in the comments!

Caro Ramsay  18 12 2015

The Killer Cook Book Non Cooking Cook off

 Here’s a wee question for you. What is a cranachan?

Is it         a) a very small house in a cold and rainy place

                                 

                b) a wee fuzzy creature that lives at the bottom of the garden     

                               

                c)  a whisky based dessert

                           

All will become unclear … 

As you may know I edited the killer cookbook  for the Million For a Morgue campaign. I was rather pleased when  I got the programme for the Bloody Scotland Crimefest and saw that as well as my own event, there was the “Killer Cook Book Cook Off’ based on the  TV programme "the Great British Bake Off". There was to be four crime writers cooking live (and it was to be filmed for TV) plus me running around with a mic. The hotel chef was going to do the Paul Hollywood bit ...  (He’s the chef on the TV)

                                       

             This is Paul Hollywood, I have no idea what the hotel chef looked like. He was keeping well clear.

What could go wrong?

Well, turns out the hotel changed hands and nobody checked with the new owners that they were OK with isolating the fire alarms for the event. And only told us on the Thursday  evening ( the  event was due on the Sunday ). The hotel cancelled it. With about 70 tickets sold. And only my name was on the tickets.

Mmmmm …

I don’t really know what happened next but the hotel seemed to go in the huff. The organisers tried to cancel the tickets and then that wee bit of Scotty recalcitrance came in ... the one thing you don’t say to me is health and safety …. For a morgue !!!!….

All week I had been doing press interviews and being photographed in my own kitchen (!!!!) saying ‘’ oh we are very much keeping it under wraps re who is appearing etc,” basically talking bull pooh.

So I got to work. I baked 70 flapjacks, had to  buy booze for the two cocktails (not the Grey Goose Vodka, this was supermarket cheapo). Then buy all the ingredients, then  go through the non cooking  recipes and think  about what we would need to make them, then serve them ... and … get them to Stirling. I live in Elderslie ( an hour away by motorway). Then there was the real health and safety issue of keeping food in hotel room for 48 hours … fresh cream… raspberries…..fromage frais ….salmonella etc.

In the end, we left some stuff in the  car boot.  Stuck some stuff in the freezer. Alan ran down the very steep hill to Marks and Spencer four times on the day to buy ‘more stuff’. And back up again laden with ‘couldn’t get that stuff but got the nearest I could get’ stuff. He’s used to running marathons so feel no sympathy. Wee cheapo shops were a great  source of comedy bloody hands, plastic shot glasses, napkins,  cocktail sticks ... and slowly a planned formed. I woke  up in the middle of the  night and told the dog that  we would not be downhearted. We were going to do  "can’t cook, won’t cook" but change it to  "want to cook, not allowed to cook."

Who needs Paul Hollywood when you have criminal minds!

                                     

                            Criminal masterminds armed, dangerous, ready to cause liver damage.

 All Sunday we spent chopping and cutting and mixing, the salsa refused to defrost, the flapjacks tray was piled high, the cranachans kept eacaping etc. Five other authors had moments of insanity and because they are scared of me, ( I was wielding a large knife) offered to join in. 'Team bald’ Craig and Gordon (who has guest blogged for MIE) and ‘team blonde’ Alex, Lin and a Californian Scot called Catriona McPherson ( who was then flying out to Bouchercon!)

So ... to set the scene… I walked on behind a table laden with cocktail shakers… this is then what 

happened …

                               

I introduce team bald. They walk in to the tune The Stripper. Gordon is six feet four and was wearing a tall chef’s hat. He was wearing a pink diamante apron. Craig was wearing chef whites covered in fake blood. Well that  is what  we told the police. They both carried their trays aloft and swaggered. Team blonde came in, with a swagger, to the tune of ‘I’m too sexy for my apron...’

                                  

                                        Mr Urqhart in action, see collie dog under Pat's arm

By the time I had introduced the girls, the boys were already on the way to making their cocktails. They had the bottles open. I’ve now seen the photos (at the time I was busy) and they are swigging the stuff behind my back, mm... the boys were supposed to be making the Margueritas donated for the book by the anthropologist’s husband.  The anthropologist said later that she was surprised more of the audience didn’t end up in her morgue the way they were slinging the stuff about, forcing the audience to knock back shorts of almost neat tequila. Team blonde were more organised. One was dressing her homemade scones and the table with jam and squirty cream as her team mates went to town with Peter James’ writing martini. As it was made with four quid vodka not his forty quid vodka, it turned out more like nail varnish remover.

                                        

The olives went down well though.

Two slaves from the audience walking through the crowds with trays  of Martini, shots of Margueritas, (supercharged), Bloody Mary tomatoes,(more vodka but some vitamin C), 70 flapjacks, and some half frozen salsa that  really did look as if it belonged in the  morgue. Mr “Urquhart” was a haematologist and the other was a nice lady called Pat McCollie (see photo and giggle). I think the collie was donated to a nice wee kid in the audience who asked the only sensible question. Probably as the grownups were all puggled by then. Pat  did a  whip round and we got more than a hundred pounds for the charity as well.

                                            

                                                      The green T shirts are crew, muscling in on the event.

Then the boys started on their Ewert Gren’s sandwich donated by new MIE blogger Anders Rosland.  Craig was starting to cut the ham with a whisk. Gordon’s wife had told me he was so hopeless in the kitchen that he couldn’t open a can of beans. I thought she was joking. She wasn’t. Catriona pointed out that the famous McSween haggis people had given her an award for making her own haggis as “there is no good haggis in California”.  Lin was chastising folk in the audience for olive swilling… that might become yet another national sport.

                                                  

                                                Catriona persuading the audience to nibble some frozen salsa.

We then tried what I think might be a world record for cranachan assembly. I have looked back at the video. I had no idea that so many of the TV crew and the Bloody Scotland PR team had wandered into the event, and got on stage  to lend a hand. Or get in the way. Or steal something  to eat.

We had 50 or 60 glasses on the front of the stage and we then tried to fill them all up with cranachan….to the tune of Benny Hill…… never spilled a drop. I hope you enjoy the unofficial photos.

Later Catriona was hiding in the loo and overheard somebody say the event was the highlight of the festival for her, she had seen Jo Nesbo but thought we were funnier!  Someone came up to me in the car park and said they had never laughed so much in their life- was it all rehearsed…..( wit? ) It was a perfect highlight to a great weekend ... oh there was proper stuff like Lee Child,  Val McDermid, Dr David Wilson and others, but none of them had a supporting cast of cranachan the way we did!

The MIE bloggers have supported the campaign all the way through. Here is a video  link   to a spontaneous interview for the daily record you might  like to see, that  is a very sharp knife in my hand. Can  you tell I’m making it all up as I go along?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jn-nSzSBOCg

Enjoy, Caro 20th September 2013

Guest Blog Gordon Brown; Bloody Scotland Crime Writing Festival

                                       

All together now,

"B.  A.  Y.   B. A. Y.    B. A. Y . C. I. T. Y

R. O. L. L. E. R. S.

The Bay City Rollers are the best." 

That's how the tune goes!

Due to bad timing, Crimefest finished on Sunday and Scottish Crime Fiction Week started on Monday. So I am here, there and occasionally everywhere at once.

Those Crimefest dudes,  Adrian and Myles must have sat down and had an idea about a  festival of Crime Fiction in a pub at some point in time and  the rest is history. My guest blogger was caught up in a similar train of thought in  2011. All will be revealed as I introduce the rather marvelous super being that is Gordon Brown

                                          

 ( no not that one!)

This one.....tall bloke, looking like he's been up to something!

 He is one third of the brains behind Scotland's own crime festival. Basically two blonde crime writers came up with an idea, but this is the blog from the redhead who got it all going.

Like me, Gordon has his own business and that can make finding the time for writing problematic. He is blessed in that he can  write in ten minute bursts - Martini style (anytime, anywhere, anyplace!). Also he is a Glaswegian,  and his marketing company deal with everything from alcohol to global charities and from TV to lingerie.

His debut  novel, the thriller ‘Falling’, was published in 2009- think James Bond - if James Bond had been written by Willie MacIlvanney and you won't be far wrong. The new book , ‘The Catalyst’,  is next on my  'to read' list once crime week is over. As I have not read it yet, here's  a review from the Sunday Mail.

                                         

Cracking premise, blistering action and swarms of dodgy bad guys in suits- The Catalyst is an explosive riot that keeps the suspense dial turned to high from beginning to end.

  So if you ever see a six foot five redheaded bloke at the bar at a crime festival doing the Bay City Roller dance  you can now join him  as you know the words..... Oh Sorry  Gordon, did you ask me not to mention that.....

Not The Day Job

(or being at the birth of a new crime writing festival)

by Gordon Brown

                                                

I’m sitting at the Crime Writers lunch a few years back enjoying great company, food and a lack of wine – driving does that to lunches. I was fresh back from the Harrogate Crime Festival and I commented to fellow authors - Lin Anderson and Alex Gray about the number and quality of Scottish Crime Writers in attendance. Lin and Alex then regaled me with a story of Prosecco and frustration - the idea of a festival to celebrate Scottish Crime Writing that had been born over a glass of the white stuff but was, as yet, still some way in the future. My mouth, never one to wait for my brain to engage, decides that five words are appropriate at this juncture. ‘How hard can it be?’ I’m heard to say.

How hard can it be? I’ll tell you now - a damn site harder than it appeared to be on that sunny, Friday afternoon. Why? Well hands up to those who happen to have the spare time - that is, unpaid spare time - to organize what would turn out to be thirty events over three days involving some 40 authors. Oh and it needed to be profitable and professionally run.

So off we go.

First up we need a team. Contact books, friends and relations get us off the ground and the first chapter of the new venture is written. Everybody is allocated tasks from contacting authors, to raising cash, to the marketing of the event. Things look good. We’re over a year out from the proposed date but time is a devil with quick feet. We need a location. We need finance. We need more help. We need a website. We need venues. We need a name. We need, we need, we need. (Oh and ‘Bloody Scotland’ is such a good name – well done Lin).

Meanwhile we’re all trying to do our day jobs. I’m a creativity trainer and marketing strategist – honestly I’m not making it up – that’s what I do. I also write. I’ve had three novels published to date – Falling, 59 Minutes and The Catalyst. To add to my life I’m a DJ at the local radio station – ‘Laid Back with Gordon and Scott’ is Pulse 98.4FM’s most horizontal show. On top of that I have two kids ploughing through school and university whilst my lovely wife, Lesley, is doing a postgraduate degree. Also, at the time we started the whole ‘Bloody Scotland’ thing, I had clients who were inconveniently located in ‘Englandshire’ so overnights were the norm and to top it all my new book was being crafted. All in all I couldn’t find two seconds to take a deep breath. And to be fair that’s when stuff works. I’m of the opinion that the mantra – ‘if you want something done give it to a busy person’ – is up there with ‘If you don’t ask you don’t get’ as the sagest of advice.

Did we make mistakes along the way? – hell yes! Underestimating the workload was one. Considering a hotel that wasn’t even built was another. But we had our share of wins. Getting Val McDermid and Ian Rankin onside from the outset gave us kudos. An ever expanding committee with just the right magic mix helped and picking Stirling as the location was wonderful – thanks to Stirling Council for all their help.

So the Bloody Scotland express train was heading for the 14^th of September 2012 – three days of literary fun over one long weekend. We had a wonderful launch in the June to announce the festival. Meanwhile I’m door knocking for commercial partners and, through Sandra and her husband Donnie, we gain a main sponsor. Our wonderful chair, Jenny Brown, and a ton of work from the team provide some great funding from Creative Scotland and Visit Scotland – along with support from Stirling University and others to numerous to mention.

We have monthly meetings that turn into daily meetings. Suddenly the whole thing is real.

Over the weekend it’s all hands to the pumps. We recruit a front of house manager who has now been kidnapped to be the main man for the 2013 event (hard lines Dom). At the festival I’m down to chair a panel of four authors and among my many other tasks I need to read the latest book from each to prepare for my session. The weekend finishes with a Sherlock Holmes play - ‘The Red Headed League.’ Many of our star authors (including me) are on stage - well as a red head it was compulsory I took part. The curtain comes down and we all collapse to the ground.

Was it a success – absolutely? We targeted 2,500 ticket sales and exceeded 4,000 in the end. We got some wonderful media coverage and the feedback from visitors was brilliant. Oh and we made a profit but as a charitable business it all goes back into this years event.

Did we learn any lessons? The fact that 2013 is about to happen maybe suggests that we have forgotten the pain of birth and in a rosy (or should that be Prosecco) light we’re really keen sado-masochists at heart. On the other side of the coin the line up for this year is stunning. Bloody Scotland 2013 will take place on the 13^th to 15^th of September – Lee Child and Jo Nesbo headlining with many others – tickets on sale at www.bloodyscotland.com. (Advertisement over)

Is life any quieter for any of us? No. So why do it again? Love! What did I get out of it? Well a pride in being at the start of something great comes to mind. Immersion in the world of writing is another. But mainly it wasn’t my day job. It was (still is) fresh, exciting and an adventure. Is it the best thing I’ve done in the last few years? Maybe, and I only say maybe because I’m very proud of my new book and I’m also amazed that I was given the role of master of ceremonies on the main stage of a two day music festival with my fellow radio DJ – so rock’n’roll and a story for another day.

I’m not sure what this blog is about. I think I started off to tell you about Bloody Scotland but I think it’s more about trying stuff in life that makes you a bit nervous. Stuff that isn’t the day job.

GB for GB  07/06/13

Guesting for Caro.